1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to biomass chemical materials, and in particular relates to a toner composition utilizing the biomass chemical materials and method for manufacturing the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, laser printers or photostats are necessary pieces of equipment for offices and homes. Toner is the major consumable material of printers, and it should have a good humidity resistance and a low fusing temperature. In light of environmental protection and energy-efficiency concerns, the manufacturers of the printer toner have replaced high temperature kneader mixing type toner with milder chemical methods.
Although the chemical toner has several advantages such as low temperature manufacturing, energy efficiency, and low CO2 emission, it still produces waste powder when printing or when printed papers are recycled. The waste powder is usually treated by means of combustion or burying. However, the chemicals of the waste powder include acrylate-styrene copolymer or polyester, which come from petroleum, it is not bio-degradable.
In order to solve the waste powder problem, recyclable or biodegradable resins are adopted. However, the costs of using 100% recyclable material are too high to be accepted in this market. Biomass resins such as poly(lactic acid), polycaprolactone, polyhydroxyalkanoate, and similar substances have problems (e.g. water absorption problem and poor processing properties) which must be overcome. As disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,432,600, the toner is made by mixing the terpene-phenol copolymer with 20% poly(lactic acid), wherein the terpene-phenol copolymer is used to enhance anti-humidity qualities which further improves the charge stability. However, the manufacturing process of the toner is a conventional kneader process. In EP1255166, the toner is made of biodegradable polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) by a mechanical kneader. However, the raw material must be modified with high cost and its humidity absorption problems still remains. In JP2001022123, the polyester, having low melting point and specific structure, is blended with poly(lactic acid) to form the toner resin, thereby reducing the fusing temperature and preventing the poly(lactic acid) from degrading at high temperature. In JP 2008262179, the modified poly(lactic acid) and modified polyester is adopted to lower the fusing temperature of the toner. The toner is manufactured in water by solvent grinding, and the preparation of the toner still faces the solvent removal problem.
Accordingly, a novel method of manufacturing toner is called for which can save energy, lower costs, and reduce the environmental impact.